After almost ten years of campaigning, we are delighted that we now have a Marine (Scotland) Act. We particularly welcome the duty to protect and enhance our seas, a marine planning system that includes environmental targets and a duty to deliver a network of marine protected areas...

A briefing prepared by the LINK Marine taskforce for the Scottish Parliament debate on Aquaculture on the 10 March 2010

1. Defining the status of the SLUS
2. Defining the scope of the SLUS
3. Establishing the formal process for producing this and subsequent versions of the SLUS
4. Achieving better policy integration
5. Underpinning the SLUS with the ecosystem approach

See also: Living with the Land our proposals for Scotlands first sustainable landuse strategy

It addresses ten priority topics - Biodiversity, Climate Change, Ecological Footprint, Education/Volunteering, Historic and Built Environment, Landscape, Physical Activity/Health, Recreational Access, Transport, Water and Flooding.  LINK will monitor how these are addressed and overview emerging trends in the lead up to the national and local elections in 2011 and 2012.

Print version

See also our shorter general Stage 3 Briefing

LINK Marine taskforce welcomes the passing of the Marine (Scotland) Bill. 

Breifing for Stage 3 of the Marine (Scotland) Bill from Scottish Environment LINKs Marine taskforce

Including: A New Challenge for LINK - opinion piece by Helen Zealley; Living with the Land launched; introduction to Living Streets, a new LINK member and more.

Although its main purpose is to tackle climate change, the SLUS provides real opportunities to deliver other public objectives. It has potential to support landscape and wildlife protection, to ensure more co-ordinated planning and delivery between agencies, to reward multi-benefit land use and to resolve conflicts between different land uses.

"For too long we in Scotland have lived off the land, now we need to live with the land. Instead of land being viewed as simply a resource to be exploited for profit and pleasure, we must learn to nurture and sustain the natural qualities of all of our land because its health is absolutely essential to people’s well-being

See also :our brief on 1st Marshalled List of Amendments and brief on 2nd Marshalled List of Amendments.

See also :our brief on 1st Marshalled List of Amendments and brief on 3rd Marshalled List of Amendments

See also: Beyond the CAP

See also: our brief on 2nd Marshalled List of Amendments and brief on 3rd Marshalled List of Amendments.

See also our written evidence: Inquiry into the EU Budget Review and EU Budget Reform Inquiry, Additional Evidence

We broadly welcome the changes proposed and particularly welcome the introduction of much improved policy on climate change, sustainable development and flooding. However, we must make it clear that we retain doubts about the implications of the scale of reduction in background information proposed compared with the current suite of SPPs and NPPGs. We also have some concerns about the somewhat disjointed nature of the further consultation on proposed alterations to the consultation draft only, rather than consultation on a complete draft document...

Letter to Roseanna Cunningham, Environment Minister

...we say that ecological sustainability should be at the heart of those central objectives because, in the long term, that will deliver social and economic sustainability...

LINK believes that agricultural support should be directed towards promoting sustainable development in rural areas...

Stage One of the Marine (Scotland) Bill takes place on the 29th October 2009.

See report: Recovering Scotland's Marine Environment

Focusing on features for which there is good evidence of decline, the report makes a strong case that Scotland’s marine environment is in a far from pristine state and is in real need of recovery. Many habitats and species have been seriously depleted over a long period as a result of human activities, fragile habitats are particularly vulnerable to some mobile fishing gear, while the discharge of organic waste and water-borne chemical contaminants can also lead to the depletion of certain species. Unsustainable fishing practices have led to the decline of some fish stocks.

See also: press release

Reform of the CFP is timely, not only because the 2002 reform has done little to alleviate overfishing and its wider ecological footprint, but also because of the Marine Strategy Framework Directive (MSFD), which sets a challenging new context for fisheries management. The Directive requires that Europe’s seas achieve Good Environmental Status (GES) by 2020 at the latest, and requires that reform of the CFP does not impede the delivery of GES, and therefore ‘must take account of the environmental impacts of fishing’...

The future EU budget should therefore be targeted at policies which will move the EU and Scotland rapidly towards a sustainable economy; where environmental limits are not exceeded; where there are sustainable patterns of production and consumption; and where ecosystems are in a state of recovery rather than degradation.

See also our original evidence to the inquiry from December 2008

LINK also believes that this Bill allows the opportunity to look at legisaltion regarding permitted development and the biodiversity duty.

LINK letter to Jim Murphy MP, Secretary of State for Scotland and Convener of the Calman Steering Group

Topics under discussion included; marine planning partnerships, marine regions, the ecosystem approach, Marine Scotland and aquaculture.

We are concerned, that the provisions in relation to environmental recovery are much weaker, with no provisions to improve or recover the ecological status of Scottish waters beyond the boundaries of marine protected areas. The requirement to promote recovery of the marine environment as a whole is enshrined in various international and national agreements, including the Convention on Biological Diversity, the Marine Strategy Framework Directive and the recently published UK High Level Marine Objectives. The key outcome of the Bill, the one by which its ultimate success is measured, must be a healthy, well functioning and biodiverse marine environment. In order for the Bill to contribute to this outcome we believe that objectives relating to the health of marine species, habitats and ecosystems (marine ecosystem objectives) must play a pivotal role. Such objectives must provide direction to, and underpin evaluation of, the effectiveness of the marine planning system. There must be a duty on public bodies to contribute to their achievement. We are concerned that the Bill allows for ecosystem objectives to be traded-off against short-term social and economic objectives, resulting in a continued deterioration of both the sea’s health and its productivity.

The key amendments for stage 3 include strengthening provisions for the consideration of natural flood management, ensuring that Ministers provide adequate funds to responsible authorities and SEPA to implement the new Act, and addressing the issue of sustainability of the Water Industry Commission and Scottish Water.

After years of campaigning, we are delighted to see a Marine Bill before the Scottish Parliament. This Bill is a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to ensure that our seas are adequately protected and sustainably managed, so that future generations can benefit from them as we have.

As the Bill progresses, it is now crucial that we get it right. Healthy seas are the foundation on which all other activities at sea depend and therefore need to be at the very heart of what the Bill is for. A healthy marine ecosystem underpins the productivity of our seas: human induced changes to this ecosystem result not only in the decline of marine wildlife, but also in damage to the economy, as fishing, wildlife tourism and other industries suffer the consequences.’